Social scientists have long observed that the social environment and inter-personal relationships exert substantive influences on health and health-related behaviors. The deadline for submission is April 30, 2013.

In particular, the past decade has seen a growing interest in the how social networks influence health behaviors including: smoking, obesity, suicide, interpersonal violence, drug use, and communicable diseases and pathogens.  For this Special Issue, Social Science & Medicine will assemble a collection of empirical, conceptual, and systematic review articles that will make novel contributions to advancing social science inquiry into how social networks affect health and mental health. We are most interested in work that conceptualizes social networks as ties that cut across traditional, “a priori” bounds such as kinship, geographic, or class constraints or expectations. The overall issue is intended to be inter- and multidisciplinary in scope, involving varied disciplines such as anthropology, development studies, economics, political science, public health, and/or sociology.

For this Special Issue, Social Science & Medicine encourages empirical (quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods), conceptual, or systematic review papers on any topic related to social networks and health.

Of particular interest are papers that

• Analyze specific mechanisms through which social networks may affect health or mental health, including social support, social influence, social engagement, contagion, and access to material goods and resources;
• Examine specific pathways proximate to health outcomes, including health-related behaviors, cognitive and emotional states, and physiologic stress responses; and
• Employ experimental or quasi-experimental designs to estimate the effects of interventions on social network structures or collateral health outcomes, or study designs that incorporate social network information into the interventions themselves.

In keeping with the international scope of Social Science & Medicine, we highly encourage manuscripts based on data collected in non-Western settings. Priority will also be given to manuscripts that address health-related issues of concern to vulnerable populations.

Please contact the Guest Editors, Andrew V. Papachristos, PhD ([email protected]) or Alexander C. Tsai, MD, PhD ([email protected]), for any queries regarding this Special Issue. Authors who feel their work addresses the above aims should submit their full manuscripts for consideration to Social Science & Medicine at http://ees.elsevier.com/ssm by 30 April 2013.
When asked to choose article type, authors should choose Submit New Article and select the appropriate Special Issue title from the drop down Article Type menu.  For further help with this submission step, please visit our online support site.  All submissions should meet Social Science & Medicine author guidelines criteria, available to view at: http://www.elsevier.com/journals/social-science-and-medicine/0277-9536/guide-for-authors.